


Spider Bond

by TheAsexualofSpades



Series: Quarantine Drabbles [15]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Civil War didn't happen that way and I will die on this hill, Fluff, Gen, Momma and Baby Spider, Natasha will give him one, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Not Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Compliant, Not Canon Compliant, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Protective Natasha Romanov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:28:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23545402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAsexualofSpades/pseuds/TheAsexualofSpades
Summary: Natasha doesn't get close to people easily. There is always an exception to the rule.Peter "Actual Ray of Sunshine" Parker is this exception.
Relationships: Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov, Natasha Romanov & Avengers Team, Peter Parker & Natasha Romanov, Peter Parker & Tony Stark, Tony Stark & Natasha Romanov
Series: Quarantine Drabbles [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1677655
Comments: 33
Kudos: 804





	Spider Bond

**Author's Note:**

> you guys wanted more Natasha and Peter being Momma and Baby Spider so here we go

Fandom: Marvel (MCU)

Prompt: “I love your hugs.”

* * *

Natasha isn’t very used to getting close to people, not that this should come as a surprise to anyone. And she’s not about to explain her reasons for this to just anyone, thank you very much.

There are exceptions where she does get close to people, but that takes time. Clint, obviously, and Fury. Maria. Tony. Steve. Sam. Bruce. Thor. Rhodes. She’s got a family now and she wouldn’t trade it for the world. It’s been won through blood, sweat, and tears, taking its time to work its way through the layers of her armor, nestling next to her heart.

Then comes this kid and barges right through them.

The first time she hears Tony’s got a kid she immediately sends something to Pepper, asking what the hell is going on, why wasn’t she invited to the baby shower.

“Oh, no, Peter’s not Tony’s biologically,” Pepper laughs, “he’s from Queens.”

“So Stark’s found another genius super kid, huh,” Natasha says, taking a sip from her coffee as she watches Tony drop said genius super kid off at his high school.

“Yep. You know Tony.”

“Yeah,” Natasha murmurs, “I do.”

Tony’s like her. Doesn’t trust easy. Where she and Tony differ is that Tony’s got a heart that makes him seek out those like him, wrapping them into his family. Natasha envies him sometimes if she’s being honest.

_What’s that like?_

So if she keeps a close eye on the kid, it’s for security reasons and for Tony’s sake. Man’s been through enough.

Tony notices, of course, as do the rest of them. Pulls her aside one day all over-protective dad, what-are-you-doing-with-my-kid. He doesn’t say any of that out loud, of course, nor does he realizes he’s doing it to the extent he is. Natasha knows. Explains she’s making sure he’s safe. Plays the pronoun game a bit but that never really hurt anybody; Tony doesn’t need to know she’s doing it more for _him_ than the kid.

At least she’s not until one day when the kid’s leaving school, he doesn’t jam his headphones in and head for the train. He looks around and then walks directly for the café she’s camped out at. She doesn’t move. Doesn’t wobble in the raising of her coffee to take a sip.

Up close, the kid’s even younger. No hard lines, no hard glint in his eyes, no thousand-yard stare. This is a _kid._ He runs his hand nervously through his hair and slowly approaches her table.

“Um…Miss, um, Widow?”

She blinks.

“Hi, um. My…my name’s Peter.” The kid shuffles nervously, folding and unfolding his arms. “Uh, Mr. Stark said you were, um, gonna talk to me today after school, um, and I should meet you here.”

_Oh did he, now?_

“That’s right.” Natasha takes another long sip from her coffee, watching the kid fidget under her gaze. “Why don’t you go get something to drink and join me?”

“Oh, okay.” The kid scrambles to get his backpack off and onto the chair. “Do you, uh, want anything else?”

“No thank you.”

“Okay.”

Natasha doesn’t betray her surprise other than a very quick squint as the kid dashes away. No wonder Tony snapped him up quick if he’s like that to someone he just met. Offering to buy her something? Just like that? 

The kid returns with a smoothie and sits in the chair, sipping from the green straw. “So. um, what did you want to talk about?”

“Let’s talk about you.”

The straw pops out of his mouth. “O-okay. What do you want to know?”

This isn’t an interrogation. Well, not a proper one, anyway, so she asks him basic questions. Where he grew up, his friends, his family. What he studies in school. Favorite color. She doesn’t learn anything she doesn’t already know, except that his favorite color is blue.

“Arc-reactor blue?”

She hides a smirk behind her cup as the kid’s face goes pink and he hastily takes another sip of his smoothie. “Maybe.”

“Then why isn’t your suit blue?”

“My suit?”

“Your superhero suit.” Natasha raises an eyebrow when the kid’s eyes go wide, looking around frantically. “Something wrong?”

“It’s a _secret,_ ” the kid whispers, “you know?”

“Oh, okay. It’s a secret.” She waits for the kid to calm down before prompting: “but why isn’t it blue?”

The kid shrugs. “The vest I made it out of was red. I guess Mr. Stark wanted to keep the color scheme.”

Speaking of ‘Mr. Stark…’

“Why did he bring you to Germany?”

The kid looks down at the table, twisting the straw wrapper between his fingers. “Said I could help. My…skills were useful.”

“You know that’s not it,” she says, leaning forward. “Why _you_?”

A train rattles past the station overhead. A dog barks. The traffic light changes.

“I think it was something I said to him,” the kid says finally, “when he asked me why I was doing this stuff.”

“And that was?”

“That I had a responsibility to. I…I can do stuff to stop bad things from happening.” For the first time since he sat down, the kid looks up and makes eye contact with her. “Because if you can do something and you don’t, the bad things happen because of you.”

_...jeez, kid, good answer._

That’s enough for today. She’s got what she needed.

“You like ice cream?”

Peter blinks. “What?”

“Do you like ice cream?”

“Uh, yeah. Who doesn’t?”

Natasha smiles. “Then come on. I know a really good, _expensive_ ice cream place you’ll love.”

“Wait, I can’t—“

“I’m sure Mr. Stark won’t mind if I charge it to his card,” Natasha says, waving the card in front of Peter as they leave the café. “You mind walking? It’s not far.”

“No, I’m good.”

When she drops him off at his house later, she’s got half a mind to call Tony up and give him a stern why-are-you-dragging-an-actual-child-into-our-nonsense talk. But she doesn’t. She knows this kid is going to be doing whatever _this_ is on his own no matter what. It won’t hurt to have an Iron Dad around the corner to fuss and worry for his safety while knowing damn well he’s no better.

It’ll be good for them.

She meets Peter at the café once a week, asking about his classes, listening to him ramble about whatever amazing thing he’s working on with Tony, making sure he’s alright from his superhero-ing. He answers her questions with a big smile on his face and if she were someone else, she’d say he looks like sunshine.

But she’s not, so she teases Tony mercilessly about his adoptee and, in private, makes sure he knows how proud she is.

Then he shows up one day and won’t look up at her. She tries to move enough to catch his eye but he’s staring resolutely down at the table.

“Hey,” she murmurs, gentling her voice and reaching across to lay her hand over his. His hands are rough under hers, too rough for a kid’s. “What’s wrong?”

Peter looks up. One eye is bruised and swollen. Single impact, probably not from a fist, judging by the areas of discoloration. Sharp angle means it was probably a textbook. Possibly the corner of a locker.

“Who?”

Peter blinks. “What?”

Natasha juts her chin toward the injury. “Who?”

Realization dawns. Peter shakes his head. “It’s okay, it wasn’t during the…stuff.”

“That’s not what I asked,” she repeats, taking his hand and holding it tight. “Who did this, Peter?”

“It’s just some of the kids at school shoved me and I lost my balance. It’s fine, really, I—wait!” He grabs her hand tightly as she goes for her phone. “Don’t do anything to them, it’s not their fault, seriously, I’m okay, I can deal with it. Don’t tell Mr. Stark.”

Natasha pauses, phone still in hand.

“Peter,” she says softly, “I know you are capable of ‘dealing with it,’ but if you’re going to try and convince me that _this—_ “ she flutters her fingers lightly over the wound, easing off when he flinches—“was an accident, it’s not going to work.”

Peter slumps, hunching his shoulders defensively. “I don’t need protection from them. I _am_ capable of handling a couple of high school bullies.”

“I know.” Natasha scoots her chair around to his side of the table. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t have a little help.”

She runs her hand through his, watching Peter lean a little closer to her.

“Have you told May about this?”

“She knows about the bullies.”

“Does Tony know?”

“No. And I don’t want him to.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’ll try to fix it. He always tries to fix problems and not all of them are his to fix.”

She knows _that,_ believe her. “Can you tell me what happened today?”

Peter hesitates. “I was talking about the…stuff and the internship with Mr. Stark. Fl—one of the kids heard me and said I was lying for attention.”

She files away the beginning of the name for later. “What else?”

“I, um, told him I wasn’t lying,” Peter mumbles, “and I think I accidentally said I was…meeting you today too.”

“Then he pushed you.”

“…yeah.”

Natasha straightens up, glancing toward the school, gears turning.

“Can—“ her attention snaps back to Peter, looking up at her with those big doe eyes of his— “can we go get ice cream again?”

“Absolutely.”

She drops him off at his house with a quick word to May, explaining what happened. They hatch a plan for tomorrow.

Natasha’s standing outside the car, arguing with Clint about the proper length for an inseam on a leather jacket when Peter’s front door slams shut. She looks up, smile on her face at Peter’s very confused one.

“Um, good morning.”

“Good morning, Peter,” Natasha says, “come on. Hop in.”

“Um, where—where are we going?” Peter rushes to the door she holds open.

“I’m taking you to school.”

“…okay.”

She chose the fancy car today, pulling up in front of the school with a flourish. She gets out with Peter, making sure everyone can see that it’s _her_ dropping him off. Peter’s blushing again, all the eyes clearly making him shy. She waves nonchalantly at a few starstruck high schoolers and waits by his side.

“Peter,” she calls quietly, too quiet for anyone else to hear, “if anything like that happens again you tell _me,_ you understand?”

“Yeah,” Peter says, “I got it.”

“Good. Come here.”

Peter’s eyes widen but he doesn’t question it, stepping into the hug Natasha offers willingly. She watches him walk all the way up the steps, waving at him when he turns around. She catches another student watching them, slack-jawed. She narrows her eyes when she hears another student call them Flash. Interesting.

She gets back into the car and the reality of what she’s just done hits her.

When did Peter work his way through all of her defenses? When did she let down her guard long enough to get so protective over this kid?

Why doesn’t she feel guilty, scared that she’s going soft? Why doesn’t she care?

Her phone buzzes and she pulls it out.

_Peter: Thanks, Miss Widow._

Natasha smiles and thinks she really doesn’t care.

_Me: My name’s Natasha, Peter._

_Peter: ok Miss Natasha_

Natasha rolls her eyes. If the kid’s still calling Tony ‘Mr. Stark’ she shouldn’t be surprised. He’ll be the first one the kid’s on a first-name basis with.

He is, to no one’s surprise, but she’s the second.

It’s late at the base, late enough that she’s surprised to see two signatures in the lab, not just Tony’s. It’s way past the time where any workers should still be here. She can’t help frowning when the elevator doors open and deposit Peter in the common space.

“Peter? What are you doing here so late?”

The teen blearily rubs his eyes and stifles a yawn. “Tony and I got caught up. Says it’s kinda late to drop me off back home and May said it was okay if I stay here.”

His eyes widen, sleep chased away momentarily. “Uh, is, uh, that okay?”

“Of course, Peter. You stay as long as you want.”

She expects a quiet thank-you or even just a sleepy nod. She doesn’t expect to have an armful of tired Peter Parker hugging her with his head buried in the crook of her neck, mumbling into the fabric of her shirt.

“Hey, hey,” she laughs uncertainly, “easy there. Let’s sit down before you knock us both over, hmm?”

They end up tangled together on the couch. Despite the vulnerable position this puts her in, Natasha finds she doesn’t seem to mind. The kid is a sold warm weight in her lap, the amount of trust in his posture making her head spin. She delicately threads her fingers through his mess of curls, smiling when he moans and relaxes against her. Natasha tightens her grip and pulls Peter fully into her lap.

“I love your hugs,” comes the sleepy whisper, “…’anks, Natasha.”

She doesn’t say a word, running her fingers through his hair until he falls asleep. Tony walks in a few minutes later, takes in the picture, and a wide smirk spreads across his face.

“Not one word, Stark,” she growls.

It’s enough to ward him off of teasing her directly, it’s not enough to stop everyone walking into breakfast to a huge blown-up image of the two of them sleeping on the couch with the caption: “Momma and Baby Spider.”

Peter blushes, she threatens Stark in Russian, and they leave with the laughter of the team behind them.

As she pulls up to the school, she catches Peter in another one-armed hug.

“Have a good day at school, Baby Spider.”

“Thanks, Natasha.” Peter fiddles with his hands. “Can I, um, can I kiss your cheek please?”

Natasha’s cold heart melts. “Of course, Baby Spider.”

When she pulls away, back to base, she can’t stop smiling.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Come yell at me on tumblr while we're all in quarantine. 
> 
> https://a-small-batch-of-dragons.tumblr.com/


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